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FBI tells what went on inside bunker with Jimmy Lee Dykes

FBI photos show the underground bunker where a five year old boy was rescued after being held hostage for one week. Julie Noce reports.

AS FBI negotiators tried for nearly a week to coax a US man into freeing a 5-year-old boy held hostage, the captor was making his own plans.

He rigged the bunker with explosives and tried to reinforce it against any raid, and when agents stormed the shelter on Monday, Jimmy Lee Dykes engaged in a firefight that left him dead, the FBI and officials said.

Relatives said the boy, who turns six on Wednesday, was back at home and appeared to be doing well. He was seized off a crowded school bus on January 29 after authorities say the gunman shot the driver dead and took the boy at random. Officials said there was no indication that Dykes had harmed the boy.

While the FBI has said little about how it monitored Dykes' behaviour and mood in the days leading up to the rescue, the latest revelations suggest authorities were dealing with an abductor prepared for more violence even as he allowed police to send food, medicine and toys into the bunker for the boy.

For days, officers communicated with Dykes through a plastic pipe that rose up from the bunker, which was similar to a tornado shelter and apparently had running water, heat and cable television.

An FBI statement late on Tuesday said Dykes, 65, had planted an explosive device in a ventilation pipe he'd told negotiators to use to communicate with him on his property in the rural Alabama community of Midland City. The suspect also placed another explosive device inside the bunker, the FBI added.

A tent covers the bunker where where a 5-year-old child was rescued by law enforcement after being held for nearly a week in Midland City, Alabama.

Dykes appears to have "reinforced the bunker against any attempted entry by law enforcement,'' FBI special agent Jason Pack said in the statement providing significant new details about how it all ended. When agents stormed the bunker, Dykes "engaged in a firefight,'' Mr Pack said.

Officers killed Dykes, said an official in Midland City, speaking on condition of anonymity because the official wasn't authorised to discuss a pending law enforcement investigation.

The two devices were "disrupted,'' Mr Pack said, but did not say whether they were detonated or disarmed.

On Monday, authorities said, Dykes had a gun and appeared increasingly agitated, and negotiations were deteriorating. The Midland City official said law enforcement agents had been observing Dykes with some sort of camera, which is how they saw that he had a gun.

Dale County Coroner Woodrow Hilboldt said on Tuesday that he had not been able to confirm exactly how Dykes died because the man's body had remained in the bunker. An autopsy was to be conducted once the body was removed.

Jimmy Lee Dykes, a 65-year-old retired trucker and Vietnam War veteran who kidnapped a five-year-old boy and held him in a bunker for a week.

The boy, who has Asperger's syndrome and attention deficit hyperactivity disorder, was said to be acting like a normal kid after his rescue.

"We know he's OK physically, but we don't know how he is mentally,'' Betty Jean Ransbottom, the boy's grandmother, said.

Neighbours had described Dykes as an unstable menace who beat a dog to death and threatened to shoot trespassers while patrolling his property armed.

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Comments on this story

Big Al of Sydney Posted at 11:32 AM February 07, 2013

Mike you troll get over yourself! God isn't meant to be holding your hand with every step you take in your life! It is called free will...He can help you see many paths but at the end it is always your choice, you have full control. Do your parents still pick out your underwear for you? I am hoping not...It's the same thing with God. How about you (and people like you) look a little deeper into what it means to believe in God before blaming him for everything bad that happens in this world! God controls no one. But he is there to listen, to make things clearer and assist in whatever way is possible without breaching free will. He can only work with what he has available to him (what you present to him, the more limited you are the tighter are his limits of being able to help you see).
I am glad the little boy came out of it alive. Only time will tell the extent of the harm caused to him. I feel for the family and friends of the bus driver who chose to step up and protect the kids.

derp derp of Australia Posted at 11:17 AM February 07, 2013

How the heck would you know ANYTHING about what really happened, Judy of QLD?

Cassandra of Brisbane Posted at 11:08 AM February 07, 2013

Judy, there is NO WAY any responsible person would just "glaze over" what happened to that child and pretend he was just on holidays. He may have untold trauma that the normal layman would have no idea about.

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